he was really most Horribly afraid; his state of mind or rather body
(for the disorder was purely physical) was such that he positively
dared not remain in the same house with Flossie another day. What he
needed was change of air and scene. He approached Mrs. Downey with a
shame-faced air, and a tale of how he was seedy and thought if he
could get away for a week it would set him up. It seemed to him that
Mrs. Downey's manner conveyed the most perfect comprehension of his
condition. He did not care; he was brought so low that he could almost
have confided in Mrs. Downey. "Mark my words," said the wise woman to
the drawing-room. "He'll be back again before the week's up." And as
usual, little Flossie marked them.

He walked out to Hampstead that very evening and engaged rooms there
by the week, on the understanding that he might require them for a
month or more. He did not certainly know how long the cure would take.

Hampstead is a charming and salubrious suburb, and Jewdwine was really
very decent to him while he was there, but in four days he had had
more of the cure than he wanted. Or was it that he didn't want to be
cured? Anyway a week was enough to prove that the flight to Hampstead
was a mistake. He had now an opportunity of observing Miss Flossie
from a judicious distance, with the result that her image was seen
through a tender wash of atmosphere at the precise moment when it
acquired relief. He began to miss her morning greetings, the soft
touch of her hand when they said good-night, and the voice that seemed
to be always saying, "How orf'ly good of you," "Thanks orf'ly, Mr.
Rickman, I've had a lovely day." He hadn't given her many lovely days
lately, poor little girl.

At the end of the week, coming up from Fleet Street, instead of making
straight for the Hampstead Road as he ought to have done, he found
himself turning aside in the direction of Tavistock Place. The excuse
that he made to himself was that he wanted a book that he had left
behind at Mrs. Downey's. Now it was not in the least likely that he
had left it in the dining-room, nor yet in the drawing-room, but it
was in those places that he thought of looking first. Not finding what
he wanted, he went on dejectedly to the second floor, feeling that he
must fulfil the quest that justified his presence. And there in his
study, in, yes, _in_ it, as far in as anybody could get, by the
bookcase next the window, Flossie was sitting; and sitting (if you